Introduction

Each v.s. West Coast Hip-Hop

The West Coast - East Coast Hip-Hop rivalry stems from the mid-1990s. This feud exploded in popularity during the emergence of iconic rappers The Notorious B.I.G. from New York, and Tupac Shakur in Los Angeles. Artists such as these would regularly release diss tracks, calling each other out in epic rap battles. As this rivalry grew, each of the coast’s started creating their own distinctive sound to distance themselves from each other. The focal point of this project is to compare how these styles differed both during the “Golden Age of Hip-Hop” and today.

The corpus I will be analysing to achieve this consists of four main playlists with an additional one to be used for classification, each containing 50 tracks. The old school Hip-Hop playlists each featuring the two individual styles are named; I love My West Coast Classics & I Love My East Coast Classics. The contemporary versions of these playlists have two separate sources; State of Mind consists of “new school” east-coast songs mainly from New York and has been curated by Spotify. It’s contrasting playlist representing the West Coast has been curated by Apple Music with the name Cali Fire featuring hits mainly from California. The playlists and visualisations I have used in this project will allow me to discover the musicological differences of these styles. I have decided to include an extra playlist called “I Love My Down South Classics” which I will use in the classification exercise to determine whether Southern based Hip-Hop is more similar to East or West Coast rap and if any major influences can be detected. This portfolio aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the similarities and differences present in each of these styles of American Hip-Hop.

My preliminary assumptions can be summarised as follows. East Coast hiphop carries a more aggressive sound, while West Coast hip-hop is more laid back. East Coast natives include Public Enemy, Notorious BIG, Nas, Rakim, Run DMC and KRS One, all known for thought provoking complex lyricism accented by hard-hitting beats. West Coast Hip-Hop is mainly known for dancing and partying. Noteworthy artists from this side features The Game, Tupac Shakur, Snoop Dogg and Grandmaster Flash. The West coast scene also popularised G-Funk, a fusion between hip-hop and funk music.

East Coast: Where it all started.

West Coast: The best side!

Southern: The South got something to say.

Analysis

West vs East Coast

Energy

[1] "East Coast Classics: We Gonna Make It. Its energy: 0.961000"
[1] "West Coast Classics: Ambitionz Az A Ridah. Its energy: 0.908000"
[1] "East Coast Modern: Game Time. Its energy: 0.871000"
[1] "West Coast Modern: Children Of The Void. Its energy: 0.907000"
[1] "East Coast Classics: 0.664340"
[1] "West Coast Classics: 0.653700"
[1] "East Coast Modern: 0.624020"
[1] "West Coast Modern: 0.605760"

Some stats on energy East Coast Classics: We Gonna Make It. Its energy:

Loudness

[1] "East Coast Classics: Hypnotize - 2014 Remaster. Its loudness: -3.439000"
[1] "West Coast Classics: The Streets - Re-Twist. Its loudness: -2.892000"
[1] "East Coast Modern: Lights On. Its loudness: -3.495000"
[1] "West Coast Modern: Children Of The Void. Its loudness: -3.053000"
[1] "East Coast Classics: -8.026380"
[1] "West Coast Classics: -8.011060"
[1] "East Coast Modern: -7.064160"
[1] "West Coast Modern: -7.270400"

Descriptive Statistics

# A tibble: 1 x 7
  mean_danceability mean_valence mean_energy mean_mode mean_acousticness
              <dbl>        <dbl>       <dbl>     <dbl>             <dbl>
1             0.802        0.646       0.654      0.62            0.0840
# … with 2 more variables: mean_speechiness <dbl>, mean_tempo <dbl>
# A tibble: 1 x 7
  mean_danceability mean_valence mean_energy mean_mode mean_acousticness
              <dbl>        <dbl>       <dbl>     <dbl>             <dbl>
1             0.765        0.644       0.664      0.38             0.155
# … with 2 more variables: mean_speechiness <dbl>, mean_tempo <dbl>
# A tibble: 1 x 7
  mean_danceability mean_valence mean_energy mean_mode mean_acousticness
              <dbl>        <dbl>       <dbl>     <dbl>             <dbl>
1             0.766        0.610       0.716       0.7            0.0661
# … with 2 more variables: mean_speechiness <dbl>, mean_tempo <dbl>
# A tibble: 1 x 7
  mean_danceability mean_valence mean_energy mean_mode mean_acousticness
              <dbl>        <dbl>       <dbl>     <dbl>             <dbl>
1             0.768        0.469       0.606       0.4             0.183
# … with 2 more variables: mean_speechiness <dbl>, mean_tempo <dbl>
# A tibble: 1 x 7
  mean_danceability mean_valence mean_energy mean_mode mean_acousticness
              <dbl>        <dbl>       <dbl>     <dbl>             <dbl>
1             0.725        0.521       0.624      0.52             0.254
# … with 2 more variables: mean_speechiness <dbl>, mean_tempo <dbl>

ggplot histogram

west v.s. east

West Coast

East Coast

Comprehensive Visualisation

Old School West & East Coast classics v.s. Modern West & East Coast music

These charts display four important metrics for each playlist in my corpus. We compare valence, energy, loudness and mode in this comprehensive visualization.

Modality comparison

Old School West & East Coast classics v.s. Modern West & East Coast music

Mode indicates the modality (major or minor) of a track. Major is represented by 1 and minor is 0.

Pitch analysis

Most average song from the West Coast Classics playlist

Song name

Most average song from the East Coast Classics playlist

> song name

Most average song from the West Coast Modern playlist

> song name

Most average song from the West Coast Modern playlist

> song name

Chordogram comparison of two old school hip-hop songs

Fuck the Police

Loungin

Comparison of east-coast old school hiphop song Shook Ones Pt. II by Mobb Deep with old school west-coast hiphop song Gangsta’s Paradise from Coolio. The songs have a different style as they are from opposite side’s of the country but both are from 1995 and some similarities can be found in their structure. The chordograms both represent stronger intensity with the darklines on B:7, E:7, C#:min, Eb:7 and Bb:7.

Representation of the Chroma- and Timbre features for the song “Insane in the Brain - Cypress Hill”

This chroma and timbre based self-similarty matrix represents the pitch and timbres’ structure for the song "Insane in the Brain by the notorious West Coast rap collective Cypress Hill. The chroma and timbre matrices differ greatly in terms of structure. Only the start and end of the song seem to have some similarities. The square boxes visible in both matrices are positioned in different places. No clear structure can be seen in both figures.

Clustering

Features that dominate the West Coast Classics playlists

Tempo analysis “Insane in the Brain - Cypress Hill”

*** A lot of novelty in tempo

Tempograms “Insane in the Brain - Cypress Hill”

Look at which bpm corresponds to yellow lines

Conclusion

Conclusion: Discussion of findings

This analysis has enabled me to compare two styles and two generations of hip-hop (90s and today) highlighting the features and variables that have evolved over time. Hip-hop culture today is much different than in the 80s and 90s with artists gaining access to quick distribution, cheap production and easy online traction. The music industry landscape has changed drastically boosting the Hip-Hop genre to dominate chart positions all over the world.